


the sky is blue because it misses the stars

by zarabithia



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Flashbacks, Fourth of July, M/M, PTSD, happy birthday steve
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-05
Updated: 2014-07-05
Packaged: 2018-02-07 14:55:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,134
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1903245
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zarabithia/pseuds/zarabithia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>All of his memories are still a bit hazy, which is why Bucky doesn’t initially realize what a big deal July 4th is.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the sky is blue because it misses the stars

**Author's Note:**

> The title of this fic is stolen from [this terrible country song ](http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/chelywright/yourwomanmissesherman.html)that came on Spotify when I was writing this on July 4th. 
> 
> Also, Bucky uses some ableist language about his own mental processes in this fic.

This Friday feels like any other Friday when Bucky first wakes up. He wakes up, wanders down the hall to the little bathroom that everyone on his floor shares, and leans against the door while he waits on Mister Brown to finish up.

Hotels can be traced, so Bucky isn’t living in a hotel. Bucky is spending the next thirteen days in a rent-by-the-week sleeping room in the middle of Indiana. He’s paid for the first week, and he will stay until next Thursday.

Rent is due on Friday. He has the money, but if you stay too long, they remember you. If you leave too soon, they remember you. If you leave a day shy of your second rent date, they think you’re poor. Nobody remembers you then.Though it’s true that Bucky has some hazy memories and a Smithsonian exhibit that say otherwise.

Ten minutes after Bucky first begins to wait, Mister Brown exits the bathroom. Bucky barely nods his head in hello - too friendly and they remember you, not friendly at all and they remember you - because after all, he has already carefully examined each of the seven people living in this building.

They are over the legal limit allowed to share a house this size by a factor of two, something that Bucky considers in his favor.

"Happy Fourth of July," Mister Brown says cheerfully, and suddenly, Bucky can’t breathe because …

_… Because it’s the fourth of July and there are fireworks and they’ve had too much watered down whiskey and Steve’s mouth is close enough to kiss if he just …_

"Son, are you alright?"

Mister Brown’s voice is quiet beside Bucky, but it’s loud enough to interrupt the deluge of memories. Bucky is thankful that this neighbor is thoughtful enough to keep his voice at a reasonable level.

Others haven’t, and caught up in the middle of a memory, Bucky is not always able to keep The Soldier from coming out of him. It’s a reflex these days, and Bucky hates what that says about him, about how weak it makes him that he can’t shake off the last holds that Hydra has on him.

"Stomach pains," Bucky tells him, and he hates doing so, because being sick is something they will remember. But so will not being sane, so the lie is the better of two blown covers. His lie works, because the old man pats him on the shoulder, gives him a recommendation for a "natural" laxative and leaves Bucky alone.

Bucky doesn’t go to the bathroom.

He doesn’t have plans to go anywhere, and that hasn’t been the case since he walked away from an unconscious Captain America. That time, he’d ended up at a Hydra base that had 32 less breathing bodies when he’d left it than when he’d shown up.

This time, he ends up standing in a bakery, staring down at the glass display of cupcakes.

There’s so many red, white, and blue ones, and ….

_… And they’re sitting in a kitchen. Steve’s drawing papers are stretched out in front of him, and there’s a lady in a worn apron, tired eyes, and sore feet. She’s mixing something in a bowl that she’s been saving up for for months. Steve is looking up at Bucky and offering, “You can lick half the bowl…”_

Bucky is leaning against the damn glass display case so hard he’s afraid that he might break it. But he only pulls back when he hears the metal start to groan against his weight.

It doesn’t crack, by some miracle. But maybe the cashier hears him too, or maybe he’s simply weirding her out by standing there and being completely lost over a display of cupcakes.

"Can I help you?"

"No," Bucky answers, because that’s one truth he isn’t uncertain about. But she’s still staring at him, and that is a bad sign. Stand here too long without ordering and that … that makes a person memorable.

"I mean, I’m just trying to decide," Bucky corrects himself.

She smiles, as though he isn’t holding onto the last shreds of his sanity like it is a train flying through the mountains. Maybe she’s seen worse. Maybe they were Hydra agents. Maybe she’s a Hydra agent.

Maybe it’s her first day and she’s sharing an apartment with a sick friend and all she can hope for is that she doesn’t get fired from a shitty job she hates because then how will they make rent? 

"There’s a lot of flavors to choose from," the lady says kindly. "It can be intimidating sometimes."

Flavors.

Bucky tries to think of that small, cramped kitchen again. He tries to remember what the hell kind of flavor the lady in the blue apron would have been making.

He stares down at the display case. Not white chocolate macadamia, that’s for damn sure, and he’s pretty sure that peanut butter caramel might have been out, too.

It would have been something simple. Something that didn’t require a million ingredients. Something …

_… Bucky’s hair is slicked back for church, but Steve’s hair is refusing to co-operate. “Stubborn Irish hair,” the lady with the blue apron is saying, except in this memory she has a simple string of pearls around her neck and a second-hand blue dress …_

"Something classic," he says. Is that right? That doesn’t seem right.

Bucky is talking about a man who dropped his shield and refused to fight back to prove a point. Classic seems to … simplistic.

"Chocolate and vanilla are big sellers," the lady says, and she’s smiling at him with sympathy.

He takes a deep breath, and for a wild moment, the phone in his pocket seems tempting. For a wild moment, he wants to dial a number he isn’t supposed to have and ask, “What flavor of cake do you like?”

He wants to ask, “What flavor of cake do I like?”

He wants to, but he doesn’t.

Instead, he says, “I’ll take one of each.”

Maybe they have always been opposites who compliment each other. Maybe whichever one of these Bucky likes, Steve’s favorite will have been the other one. Maybe he won’t have to pick up the phone and dial a number he isn’t supposed to have and inadvertedly offer hope that he can’t yet promise.

Her smile is a relieved one this time, and Bucky feels guilty enough that he knows he will leave an extra large tip even if it is one of the things that makes a person remember you after you’re gone. As she packages the cupcakes, she asks innocently, “Are these for the holiday or some other reason?”

"A friend’s birthday," Bucky tells her.

He sets the 50 dollar bill on the table before she has time to ask additional questions that he might not have the answers to.


End file.
